India, June 29 -- A fresh exchange of barbs unfolded in Maharashtra over the weekend amid an ongoing rebellion in Uddhav Thackeray's faction of Shiv Sena. Hours after Thackeray claimed that the defection of his faction's MPs was engineered to keep Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis in check, the BJP leader hit back, saying since he doesn't have wings, nobody can clip them.

As Uddhav Thackeray toured the constituencies of the six UBT Sena MPs who recently defected to the Eknath Shinde-led Sena, he said that 'Operation Devendra' was at play and was used to orchestrate the exit of the lawmakers.

"The MPs were taken away when there were no elections. Why did they not join the BJP? I suspect this is actually 'Operation Devendra'," ...